wanted to share one of the poems i'm most proud of that i wrote like 2 years ago and had forgotten about till recently. to give you some perspective, i wrote this song after seeing the movie 'hotel rwanda.' which, if you've seen it, is extremely good and is the true story of a man who saved thousands of people from the genocide which took place in rwanda in april of 1994. i know most of you won't read it but i hope you do, and comment...thanks in advance

| The Exception |

I believe in the exception
The men who go beyond the status of hero
They are the closest and the farthest from ordinary
Such men prove, through our whimsical deeds of good,
The same ones which help us sleep the sounder sleep,
That the trading of trivial benevolence for piece of mind
Is a disregard for which we are all culpable of

I believe in the exception
The nullifiers of convention and stereotypes
They open our eyes to our beloved ignorance
An ignorance of appalling magnitude
The type of which we hold so tight
For the world’s realities are too much of a burden
Not worthy of being bothered with

I believe in the exception
The one inside of every man
The few who open their eyes to man’s injustice
Create and breathe amends for their blindness,
But the minds who awaken to the genocide of decency
Yet, choose the immune life of preaching false ethics
With shrugged shoulders and empty words of remorse
Continue to be the majority, the authority
Perhaps the day when the exception becomes the rule
The sleep slept of soundness and peace
Will be shared throughout the world

recap...apollo's bachelor party was this weekend, f-in amazing time. the best man, joel, rented a house down in ac fot the weekend and it was freaking huge. there was about 20 or so guys and everyone had a good time (i think). i officially learned craps from rj and erwin since the house had its own crap table. although i then proceeded to lose 100 bucks on the crap tables later that night, ohwell, it's definitely the most fun game in the casino. but that's enough about there, and there will be no pictures posted here or anywhere else to protect the innocent :)

eagles opened up the 2006 season with a win, which is always nice. a little tougher than expected but a win non-the-less. here's hoping lito isn't out for an extended period of time. i also took both games in my two fantasy leagues, one by sheer luck, the other by sheer domination...haha

speaking of eagles, i saw invincible last week with the papa, which was fun. it's always interesting to see a movie with someone who's basically an expert on the main subject in the movie. in this case it was the 1976 philadelphia eagles and since my dad has had season tickets since 1972, he's pretty learned on the subject. it's also even funnier when said expert is going a little on the deaf side and feels the need to "whisper" little tidbids of information about the movie. i felt bad for the people sitting near us but there was a max of 10 people in the whole theater so i think it was ok...haha anyway, it was a good movie and being an eagles fan, one i appreciated probably more than most.

and now my rant...i meant to post about this a couple weeks ago when i was on one of my "use wiki to learn about a certain subject instead of doing work days" but i ran out of time...anway, i was reading up on the infamous mumia abu jamal who you may know is one of the biggest names on death row for killing a cop in 1981. now, i went into this subject knowing how many celebrities and musicians supported him (one of which being my beloved rage against the machine, hence the entire song "voice of the voiceless"). therefore, since i consider myself open minded and usually siding with the masses as opposed the "authorities" i was pretty much by default a jamal supporter even though i knew little to nothing about the case. there are thousands if not millions of people (france even named a street after him) who believe jamal is innocent, was setup and given an unfair trial, the last of which i completely agree with. however, after researching the subject, i cannot for the life of me figure out why anyone with a shred of reasoning believes this man is innocent. the big cry of his supporters is that the bullet that killed the cop back in 1981 of .44 caliber and since jamal's gun was a .38 caliber, there is no way he killed him. this is based off a police detective writing a note in the borders of his notebook that the bullet looked like a .44 caliber although he was in no means a ballistics expert and was just an immediate opinion while at the crime scene, by no means scientific. amazingly, when they did the official ballistics test on the bullet, it was found to be of .38 caliber and a federal brand special +p bullet, the exact bullets in the gun found next to the body of the police officer with spent casings scattered around. and who was this gun registered to about two years before the shooting? yup, mumia abu jamal. so, a gun was found next to a body of a dead police officer which was fired recently and had contained ammunition which exactly matches those of fatal slugs pulled from the deceased body and this gun was registered to the man who was found at the scene, also found to be shot by the deceased police officer, and yet people still believe this man to be innocent? are you freaking kidding me? now, i totally agree with his supporters who say that he was given a totally biast and unfair trial and at the least, should be given a new one in order to get all the facts straight, but seriously, how do these people really think he is innocent? his own defense attorney admitted that the bullet was "most likely" a .38 caliber. in my eyes, this man is blatantly guilty and has been made famous by blind extreme radicals who refuse to acknowledge any legitament evidence that might go against their cause. i for one am in total support of a retrial if only to set the record straight and so that this man will not die as a martyr for a cause but as the killer he really is. maybe i'm totally missing something so i'd really like to talk to a diehard mumia abu jamal supporter to get their opinion on this matter. so if anyone you know meets that criteria, please tell them to contact me :)

ok i'm done...thanks for reading